Die K-Files. Knuts Aussenposten im Indischen Ozean: The Birthday of the Polar Bear, a Cake and Lot's of Wishes

Donnerstag, 30. Dezember 2010

The Birthday of the Polar Bear, a Cake and Lot's of Wishes

Already for a very long time I wanted to show you the biggest birthday cake ever for polar bears... (In fact I did it already...). Year after year Alaska Zoo is outdoing itself in order to celebrate Ahpun's birthday in a memorable way, depending on who is her companion, she was joined in the past by Oreo and for some years now it has been Louie, a brother of Commander Sedov. The story of Ahpun and the Alaska bears I will tell you soon (hmm, let's make it asap...), today I just wanna make up for so many birthdays I have missed during the past year (human ones included)...

Oreo & Ahpun 1998/ (source)

Looking for a matching occasion I thought it had to be the last day of the year on the threshold of a beginning new one, and when I found Ulli J's information about the Polar Bear's Birthday Celebration in Russia, celebrated since 2008 on 29 December by WWF and other organisations, by the way also sponsored by Zoo Berlin, I thought why not using the cake to join also in the chorus of well wishers who congratulate all newborn cubs who are facing a difficult life in a rapidly changing world.

So - Happy Birthday to all polar bears of the Arctic, and yes, I want to extend my wishes to all ambassadors of the bear species who live in captivity, some who have never experienced the wild, and some who have had only a short taste of it before coming as orphaned cubs into human care, as it was also the case with brown bear Oreo and polar bear Ahpun, "whose mother had been shot in self defense when a native seal hunter got too close to the den without realizing it".

Let us all try not to make this wonderful species disappear from the face of the earth!